A Guide to
Nature Institute Resources

About this Guide

Since our founding in 1998, The Nature Institute has been practicing,
teaching, and refining context-rich methods for understanding the world
and for striving to ethically relate to it. Based on the fruits of that
work, we offer this resource guide for holistic sustainability education.
The resources here will prepare educators to help students integrate their
growing knowledge about nature into the broadest ecological context of
all: ethical concern for the entire natural world.

Much here is oriented toward helping educators develop the capacities they
need to perceive and understand nature in more contextual and intimate
ways. We also highlight resources for students themselves to use, and ones
that contain potential activities for students.

We hope that educators will be inspired by the resources to develop their
own original activities based on their intimate knowledge of the students
they are working with.

Each resource is briefly summarized and the appropriate educational levels
indicated. We have organized the resources in areas of focus. To go
directly to a specific area, you may click on its title below.

1. Foundations of Holistic Sustainability Education

In this essay, George Russell, professor emeritus of biology at Adelphi
University and founding co-editor of Orion magazine, asks how we can
restore to children an essential, healthy relation to the natural world.
Many children’s primary exposure to nature, he notes, is now mediated by
that most severe tool of abstraction — the electronic screen. To help
address that urgent challenge, he recommends many specific books and
authors for educators, as well as some for children, and, most importantly,
he describes the kinds of experience in nature that children need to form
a lasting bond with the rest of the natural world.

As Russell writes, “We will honor and protect what we have come to love
and admire, and such feelings have their source in personal experience.”
He adds: “Too much emphasis on concepts and the mechanical principles of
nature, especially in the early years, does little to establish the sort
of deep communion with nature” that will lead to a lasting bond. “Young
people, above all, need to sink their hands into things that are real and
actual.”

How can we develop an awareness of the transformational nature of life
that can increasingly inform our own thought and action, so that we become
more conscious and responsible participants in an evolving earth? This
book directly addresses that question. It is written as a practical guide
that shows, through concrete and vivid examples, how we can learn from the
context dependency of nature to think and act in more dynamic and
context-sensitive ways.

Class Reading: High school courses in
Environ­mental Science and Life Sciences; undergraduate and graduate
courses in Education, Environmental Science, History and Philosophy of
Science, and Life Sciences.

Teacher Resource:
A basic professional development tool for all educators, from early
childhood through postsecondary education, who are seeking to grow in the
inner capacities they hope to cultivate in their students. In particular,
the book guides educators in developing capacities to attend ever more
carefully to our participation in the concrete reality of the world we are
embedded in; to perceive it as dynamic, interwoven processes rather than a
set of separate objects; and to become more receptive, fluid, and dynamic
in our own thinking.

Every student has an unknown future, full of potential. How can a teacher
prepare individual students for what is unknown? How can the unknown play
a positive role in the life of both teacher and student as they work
together toward mutual unfolding of potential. In this article, Craig
provides teachers with guidance in crafting learning encounters for
students – that is, opportunities to experience education as attentive
exploration of the world and to participate in how living science unfolds.

A fundamental guide for holistic science education that clearly explains
the pedagogy and presents many examples of applying the methods. Craig
demonstrates how to help students: (1) develop the critical faculty of
asking questions through the use of scientific riddles; (2) develop
logical thinking anchored in observation; (3) grow in their capacities for
complex thinking that discerns the difference between a necessary
condition and an overly simplistic single-cause explanation; and (4) bring
their analytic powers together with their imagination to discover for
themselves ecological relations within and between organisms. He explains
how these skills are related to ecological thinking about the world. He
also provides specific guidance in relating the high-school science
curriculum, from 9th to 12th grade, to the changing developmental needs of
students. Craig concludes: “Nothing is more important than to help the
students school their abilities to see relations and connections, to see
how things fit together in the world. This is precisely the capacity
humanity needs to find creative solutions to the myriad problems we create
that lead to a dissolution, rather than to a building-up of the world.”

The late German physicist Martin Wagenschein, a champion for reconnecting
science education with nature and with children’s developmental needs,
explores here how both teaching and learning can become living experiences
for the participants. Wagenschein, a longtime high school teacher and
education professor, shows that covering large amounts of material is not
the way to help students learn. Real learning occurs through careful
consideration of exemplary cases in which the whole of the subject matter
can be experienced through a concrete instance. (For other teacher
resources rich in pedagogical and practical suggestions for K-12 science
classes, see Experience-Based Science
Education: The Work of Martin Wagenschein.)

In this philosophical essay on ecological responsibility, Steve suggests
that we have other choices besides trying to control nature or to leave
the “wildness” of nature untouched by human hands. We can begin to enter
into “an attentive, reverential conversation” with the partial mystery of
Otherness we encounter in the rest of the living world. “The very first —
and perhaps the most important — conversational step we can take may be to
acknowledge how we have so far failed to assume a respectful
conversational stance.” (An adapted version of this article is Chapter 3
in Nature Institute Perspectives #3:
In the Belly of the Beast: Nature,
Technology, and the Human Prospect (2004). That entire 74-page monograph
is freely available to download or can be purchased in print from our
bookstore.)

Class Reading:
grade 12 courses in Ecology and Environmental Science; undergraduate and
graduate courses in Ecology, Environmental Science, and History and
Philosophy of Science.

A guide for mediating discovery and surprise in science and sustainability
education through the powerful tool of comparison. This article shifts
attention from the molecular level to that of common observation of the
similarities and differences between phenomena – in this case, comparative
observations of trees, and in particular the sugar maple and white oak.
Comparisons help deepen understanding of both.

Class Reading and Class Activity:
High school (grades 11-12) courses in Botany and Ecology.

In response to the emerging technical potential to genetically engineer
children, this article calls for “reopening science to the categories of
meaning, value, and purpose.” At first glance, the sophisticated,
supposedly value-neutral, world of science appears at the opposite extreme
from the naive, value-centered, imaginative world of the child. “How can
you recognize a better child if you must shun the language of value? More
specifically, how can we, as scientists or parents, propose to manipulate
an individual child’s destiny if we cannot seriously ask about that
destiny — about identity and purpose and tasks?”

Class Reading:
Undergraduate and graduate courses in History and Philosophy
of Science, Molecular Biology, and Science, Technology, and Society.

A provocative essay that challenges the wisdom of efforts to teach
computer programming to young children. In such efforts, Steve argues, the
child loses — never having fully developed it in the first place — that
fluid, imaginative ability to let experience reshape itself in meaningful
ways before she carves out of it a set of atomic facts. (The award-winning
1995 book from which this chapter is excerpted was prescient in
predicting — contrary to widespread political and commercial hype at the
time — that heavily investing in computers for K-12 classrooms would not
lead to a renaissance in American education. Its concerns and critiques
remain pertinent to current wishful thinking about the role of advanced
electronic media in the education of children.)

Class Reading:
Undergraduate and graduate courses in K-12 Education,
History and Philosophy of Science, and Science, Technology and Society.

This provocative essay challenges the wisdom of efforts to increase
children’s interest in science and math by designing immersive experiences
of electronic media in the classroom. Steve notes that the ubiquity of
nature videos has not translated into a rush among young people to become
naturalists, and goes on to describe why.

Class Reading:
Undergraduate and graduate courses in pre-K to grade 12
Education, History and Philosophy of Science, and Science, Technology and
Society.

A guide to methods for self-learning that can deeply change who educators
themselves are, and prepare them to lead students in developing their own
capacities for open-minded, flexible, and critically astute thinking.
Includes specific group observational exercises that can be practiced with
both colleagues and student to encourage the consideration of different
points of view and to avoid letting assumptions and mental habits block
new learning. The goal: transformational learning, rooted in perceiving,
listening, picturing, and, over time, growing in self-awareness as well.

2. Perceiving Nature — Taking Appearances Seriously

Expressing the Being of Animals
— a recorded talk by Craig Holdrege, with many slides, exploring the
holistic vision of the German Expressionist painter, Franz Marc. (2017).

Through the story of the artist’s life, his words, and slides of his
breathtaking work, Craig shows the loving attention with which Marc
(1880-1916) was able to enter into, and profoundly convey, the life of
animals. “I have no desire to paint animals as I see them,” Marc wrote,
“but rather as they are, how they themselves see the world and feel their
being.” The slides presented here begin with Marc’s early drawings and
paintings (including fascinating photographs of his work as a young
teacher of anatomical drawing), trace his further evolution as an artist,
and end with his powerfully vibrant expressionist works.

Class Reading:
High school and undergraduate courses in the visual arts, zoology, and
ecology.

Teacher Resource:
Pre-K through undergraduate educators in the arts, humanities, zoology,
and ecology.

Can we perceive “the deeper nature of nature”? Aldo Leopold’s view of
nature transformed radically during the course of his life and this
transformation provides the focal orientation for this essay. Leopold’s
life and writings — especially his 1949 posthumous book, A Sand County
Almanac — have been a significant source of inspiration for the modern
environmental movement. Recounted here is Leopold’s vivid encounter with
a dying wolf, as well as his profound insights into the deeper character
of the natural world. He asks us to “think like a mountain” — a timely
challenge.

Class Reading:
High school courses in Ecology and Zoology; undergraduate
courses in Ecology and Environmental Science.

In a culture filled with screens and technology-mediated experiences, how
can we help children interact directly with essential realities so their
ideas can be rooted in the world and not in the fantasies of the virtual
world? Based on Craig’s presentation at the 2014 Techno Utopia Teach-In in
New York City, this article links to a video that is best watched without
sound.

Class Reading and Video Resource:
Undergraduate courses in Ecology, Education, Environmental Studies, Life
Sciences, and History and Philosophy of Science.

This book is an excellent guide for educators seeking to understand what
phenomena-based science instruction means and how to provide such
instruction at the high school and undergraduate level. It includes many
suggested classroom and outdoor activities for students (especially in
physics) and makes a powerful philosophical case for the importance of
both educating and trusting human sensory experience. It also explores the
relation between sense experience and knowing, the role of human intention
in awareness, and the importance of older students becoming aware of their
own processes in gaining knowledge. The authors – two physicists and a
philosopher – demonstrate how understanding in the physical sciences
requires rigorous attention to the physiology and psychology of the human
being who seeks to know, as well as rigorous attention to the physical
phenomena being studied. The full 174-page book is freely available to
download.

Class Activity:
High school courses in Physics and grade 12 Philosophy;
undergraduate and graduate courses in History and Philosophy of Science,
Philosophy, and Physics.

From the gracefully ponderous motion of a massive pendulum to the
mysteries hidden in still water, sound, and radioactivity, the late German
physicist Martin Wagenschein offers here a master teacher’s insights into
experienced-based learning that engages the student in a lively way.
Wagenschein was a longtime high-school science teacher and university
professor. (For other resources that are rich in pedagogical insights,
practical advice, and experiential activities for K-12 science classes,
see
Experience-Based Science Education: The Work
of Martin Wagenschein.)

To overcome our alienation from the world, it is not enough to immerse
ourselves in nature. We must learn to walk into the scientific laboratory,
take up the language of cause, mechanism, and all the rest, and learn to
shape-shift this language into a speech revealing a fuller reality.
(An adapted version of this article is Chapter 4
in Nature Institute Perspectives #3:
In the Belly of the Beast: Nature,
Technology, and the Human Prospect (2004). That entire 74-page monograph
is freely available to download or can be purchased in print from our
bookstore.)

Class Reading:
Undergraduate and graduate courses in Ecology, Environmental Science, Life
Sciences, and History and Philosophy of Science.

Throughout the summer, along roadsides near The Nature Institute, the
radiant blue flowers of chicory are in bloom. Bringing to life a
demonstration of Goethean methods of scientific study, Craig follows the
unfolding and withering of the flower over the course a day. It’s a story
of beauty and evanescence, told here in a sequence of careful botanical
observations and radiant color photos. It provides a clear guide that
educators can follow in similar holistic studies for their own
professional development, and could adapt for observational activities
with older students.

Class Activity:
High school courses in Ecology and Life Sciences;
undergraduate courses in Ecology and Life Sciences.

Class Reading:
High school courses in Ecology and Life Sciences; undergraduate courses
in Ecology and Life Sciences.

A retrospective on The Nature Institute’s 2015 watery adventure upon the
Rio Negro and Amazon rivers, describing in vivid text and photos how the
intensity and diversity of ecological relations in the Brazilian
rainforest, the largest of all rainforests, is unsurpassed.

Class Reading:
High school courses in Ecology and Life Sciences; undergraduate courses
in Ecology.

A rose, a morning glory, a verse attributed to the medieval scholar
Albertus Magnus, and a remarkable pattern of “bearded” sepals — they all
come together in this colorfully illustrated botanical study of pattern in
seeming randomness that was written by an attentive observer of a Dutch
garden.

Class Reading:
High school courses in Botany and Ecology; undergraduate courses in
Ecology.

Can we gain our scientific concepts through openness to the world instead
of imposing them on the world? It’s the difference between a living
thinking that respects the phenomena, and a habitual thinking that cuts us
off from the phenomena. By attending to the way plants grow, we begin to
appreciate the nature of living thinking. Seeds of our own transformation
are created every time we catch ourselves considering a problem or
phenomenon through some pre-formed conceptual lens and then drop that lens
and turn back, in openness, to the things themselves. In this act, we
acknowledge our ignorance and readiness to engage in the concrete
situation. With heightened awareness, we can begin forming concepts out of
interaction with the world rather than imposing them upon the world. “The
shift from abstraction and object-thinking to a plantlike dynamic thinking
would help us develop the capacities we need to truly root our
understanding and our interactions with nature in nature.” (The essay
includes practical suggestions to help develop such living thinking.)

Class Reading:
High school (grades 11-12) courses in Ecology and Life
Sciences; undergraduate and graduate courses in Ecology, Environmental
Science, History and Philosophy of Science, and Life Sciences.

In this essay about educational priorities in a device-saturated culture,
Talbott argues that educators and parents don’t need to focus time and
money on making sure that students embrace technology. Technophobia, after
all, is not a dominant trait of our society. What we need is
balance and connection. The adaptation, even addiction, to
advanced technologies occurs all too well on its own. “Children must
learn, rather, how to hold these technologies in a human balance. And I
suggest that a bird in the hand – and a pine cone, and a rock, and a
crawdad, and a snowflake – are the counterbalances we need if our
alienation from nature is not to become more than the world can bear.
These bits of nature may not seem like much to us – but that is the
problem. For the child they can hold magic – exactly the magic that, in a
matured form, may be required to ground the adult in a society encompassed
on every side by virtuality.”

Based on a study of growth patterns in trees from different settings, this
essay offers a lesson on the importance of context in understanding the
life of any organism. We learn how in an individual tree the shape of the
crown and the size of the trunk relative to the crown, express a tree’s
history: “Directing our gaze toward the form of trees leads us beyond the
tree itself. It leads us to a web of relations of which the tree is part.
Once you begin to see in such an organic form the tracks of its History
and its relations to its surroundings, every meeting with a new tree is a
source of excitement, a riddle waiting to be appreciated and deciphered.”

Class Reading:
High school and undergraduate courses in Botany and Ecology.

Goethe described the intention of his approach to science as “to portray,
rather than explain.” This essay provides a model for such a
phenomenological study of plants and habitats. Its aim is not to explain,
in the sense of depicting causal relations, but rather to create a
characterization through which something essential can speak: “Sometimes
when you stare at something directly, you don’t see it. You need to walk
around it, change vantage points and build up a picture of the larger
world of which it is a part. Then it comes into focus. So with the meadow.
Its special qualities show themselves more vividly when we place it within
the context of the changing seasons and contrast it with another
habitat — the bottomland forest.”

An essay modeling a holistic approach to biology that goes beyond
high-level abstractions – such as “genes and environment form the animal”
– to more open-ended inquiry. What’s required is close, constant
attention to what nature actually presents and then inching a way forward
to a more full-toned understanding. The essay discusses, as its focal
example, how skulls of lions raised in captivity differ dramatically from
skulls of the same subspecies that lived in the wild. Such phenomena point
to the plasticity of the organism’s genetic inheritance, and to the role
of behavior and environment in molding the organism. An animal’s “form is
given through inheritance and then molded by activity. The hereditarily
given model is something dynamic and plastic, waiting to be filled and
formed by the animal’s activity. This is what we should be picturing when
we speak of a “genetic background” or genes, not some fixed plan.”

Class Reading:
High school (grades 11-12) courses in Ecology, Life
Sciences, and Zoology; undergraduate courses in Ecology and Zoology.

3. Visual Appearance and Phenomena-Based Physics

From the gracefully ponderous motion of a massive pendulum to the
mysteries hidden in still water, sound, and radioactivity, the late German
physicist Martin Wagenschein offers here a master teacher’s insights into
experienced-based learning that engages the student in a lively way.
Wagenschein was a longtime high school science teacher and university
professor. (For other resources that are rich in pedagogical insights,
practical advice, and experiential activities for K-12 science classes,
see Experience-Based Science Education: The
Work of Martin Wagenschein.)

Class Reading:
Undergraduate and graduate courses in Education and Physics.

Physicist Georg Maier demonstrates how to model for students a calm,
steady commitment to exact observation as he guides the reader in
understanding visual phenomena based on careful attention to our own
direct experience. Maier’s work reminds us that, however “commonplace” the
subject matter, a well-trained receptivity can bring new insights and
render the matter less common than our inattention may have led us to
imagine. Maier’s work is an invitation to discovery through disciplined
perceiving. The article is an excerpt from his 2001 book An Optics of
Visual Experience.

Class Activity:
High school courses in optics; undergraduate courses in Optics and
Physics.

4. Whole Organism Biology Studies

The Nature Institute’s revolutionary approach to science is exemplified in
holistic, qualitative studies of particular whole organisms. These studies
demonstrate how each organism is characterized by wholeness and unity, and
at the same time is intimately entwined with the larger ecology of life.
For sustainability educators and their students, these studies provide a
complement and contrast to conventional laboratory and textbook studies
that focus on organisms as mechanisms. Below are selected resources for
transforming conventional approaches to academic life sciences into a new,
profoundly ecological perspective. Such a perspective is far more in tune
with the irreducible reality of our living ecosphere, within which
humanity is immersed and our activities must harmonize.

A comprehensive picture of the giraffe’s biology and ecology, with a
related discussion about the complex and controversial issue of the
giraffe’s evolution. The result is a unique portrayal of the giraffe that
exemplifies the Goethean approach to understanding animals and evolution.
It examines the many misdirected attempts to offer evolutionary
“explanations” of the giraffe’s neck, and shows how an adequate
understanding of evolution cannot be achieved unless it is based in an
understanding of active and integrated whole organisms. The booklet can be
purchased in print from our
bookstore, or
freely downloaded.

Class Reading:
High school (grades 11-12) courses in Ecology, Evolution,
Life Sciences, and Zoology; undergraduate courses in Ecology, Evolution,
and Zoology.

A many-sided portrayal of this remarkable animal and, at the same time, an
introduction for educators and students to the methods of a qualitative,
holistic biology. Readers will experience how the elephant is a unique
being that expresses itself in every aspect of its anatomy, physiology,
and behavior. The whole lives in every part. This kind of approach shows
the grave limitations of simplistic Darwinian “explanations” of animal
life, while also demonstrating that a rigorous scientific approach can
build up a living picture of an animal that enhances our sense of awe and
responsibility for our fellow creatures on earth. The booklet can be
purchased in print from our
bookstore, or
downloaded for free.

Class Reading:
High school (grades 11-12) courses in Ecology, Evolution,
Life Sciences, and Zoology; undergraduate courses in Ecology, Evolution,
and Zoology.

A 25-page photo essay and natural history of the common milkweed,
including its history through one season from early May through October.
Craig clearly articulates the process to follow for such holistic study of
a single organism and its broader ecological context: “I began studying
the plant’s life history from first emergence in spring to opening of the
fruits and seed dispersal in October and observed and compared plants in
different patches (colonies). I collected and then planted seeds from
plants from different colonies, and observed germination and young
seedling growth. I drew and photographed plants and also pressed the
leaves of numerous plants. Finally, I observed the insects that associate
with common milkweed. In addition to my own observations, which continued
over a couple of years, I carried out an extensive review of the
scientific literature on common milkweed.” The essay provides an easy to
follow guide for phenomenological research on a single whole organism for
ateacher’s own professional development. It could also be adapted for
similar holistic studies with older students. (A slightly expanded version
of this essay, with sustainability education in mind, became Chapter 5 in
Thinking Like a Plant.)

Class Activity (if adapted for students):
High school and undergraduate courses in Botany, Ecology, and Life Sciences.

Class Reading:
High school and undergraduate courses in Botany, Ecology, and Life Sciences.

The sloth is a singular animal that expresses slowness in so many of its
characteristics and even slows down processes in the rain forest in which
it lives. Educators and students will enjoy getting to know this
remarkable creature. As Craig explains: “I have tried to describe the
sloth in a way that allows us to catch glimpses of its wholeness. I can
now refer to such characteristics as slowness, inertia, blending in with
the environment, receding or pulling in and not actively projecting
outward. Each expression is a different way of pointing to the same
coherent whole. Taken alone, as abstract concepts or definitions, they are
empty. They are real only inasmuch as they light up within the description
or perception of the animal’s characteristics. But they are not things
like a bone or an eye. They are, in context, vibrant concepts that reveal
the animal’s unique way of being.”

Class Reading:
High school courses in Ecology, Evolution, and Life
Sciences; undergraduate courses in Ecology, Evolution, and Zoology.

The potent methods of whole organism biology are discussed and then
demonstrated here, allowing a glimpse into the radically different world
of a fascinating creature – the star-nosed mole. Each species lives out a
unique way-of-being. To explore an animal’s behavior, we include how it
actively and selectively relates to the world around it. This we can call
the animal’s intentionality – how it shapes its existence by its ways of
interacting. By carefully observing an animal’s behavior and the concrete
context of its different behaviors, we gain understanding of its specific
intentionality. But we can’t fully penetrate this behavior without
attending to how it moves and the way this movement is shaped
through the form and function of its various organs. The point is to build
up vivid pictures of the animal from as many sides as possible. By
continually immersing ourselves in concrete observation and then
connecting our observations to vivid inner images, we enter into a
conversation with the animal. Through such methods, the animal begins to
show itself – in this case, the remarkable star-nosed mole.

Class Reading:
High school (grades 11-12) courses in Ecology, Evolution,
Life Sciences, and Zoology; undergraduate courses in Ecology, Evolution,
Zoology.

A whole-organism sketch, in words and hand-drawn illustrations, of a
“lowly” plant with some extraordinary qualities. This provides both a
practical example and inspiration for educators seeking (1) to develop
their own practice in holistic studies of life, and (2) a model to adapt
for students to practice as well.

In attending closely to skunk cabbage, we enter into conversation with a
unique and rich world. The skunk cabbage has a fluid, bud-like quality,
and in late winter it can melt its way through the snow by means of its
animal-like body heat. We have to return to the plant again and again,
questioning and searching for understanding. To see the plant’s life, it
has to become alive in us. We must, as Goethe puts it, become “as flexible
and mobile as nature herself” to penetrate beyond the surface of facts to
what gives life and coherence to nature’s creations. Skunk cabbage reveals
to us the fluid quality of water in the way it unfolds and decays, as well
as in its undulating, flowing forms. And in all of these characteristics
we see a vivid picture of early spring — a plant that is bud-like in so many
ways and yet unfolds to bring the first life and movement to a still
slumbering habitat. With such experiential understanding, every fresh
encounter with the plant can be met with expectation of something more to
learn. This attitude begins to inform our overall orientation toward
nature. Any other plant, bug, or bird appears immediately as a riddle and
not a thing. We know it carries within itself a whole, unique world just
waiting to be disclosed.

A sketch, in words and hand-drawn illustrations by the author, of the life
cycle of the bloodroot plant (Sanguinaria canadensis), an early
spring forest wildflower. In it, Craig models how to conduct a whole
organism study, over time, incorporating meticulous observation, artistic
appreciation, and knowledge gleaned from earlier scientific studies. He
also clearly describes the holistic, Goethean methodology so that teachers
(and their students) can practice it: “We have to get out and observe,
actively taking in what nature can show us … My method is
straightforward: I go out repeatedly to observe, sketch and often
photograph the plant. Back inside, I try to reform the image I obtained
from my observations. It’s quite easy to follow the plant in its early
stages, where everything changes rapidly and holds one’s interest. After
the flowering stage, it takes much more will to stick with the plant — to
see it through the year. Only in the whole cycle of the year can the plant
really show itself. How much it reveals depends on the care one takes in
observing and on one’s ability to connect the separate observations in
order to bring the actual process of transformation alive. Only then does
the character of the plant become more tangible.”

Class Activity:
Lower school (grades 4-5), middle school, and high school courses;
undergraduate courses in Ecology, Environmental Science, and Life
Sciences.

A companion piece to the Goethean exercises described in the study of
bloodroot above. In addition to a bloodroot plant being a process in time,
it also extends beyond itself, as a physical entity, revealing itself
functionally as part of a larger whole. Examples in the article begin with
the ant larvae that feed on bloodroot seeds and then disperse them in
their waste, and then ranges on to giraffes, and bison. Each example shows
how inappropriate it can be to draw rigid lines between organisms and
their environment.

5. The Living Nature of Life – From Mechanism to Organism

Many of the articles in this section are abridged versions of longer
articles that can be found on our web resource,
Biology Worthy of Life. You
may want to browse through that large collection of publications. They
clarify how common, mechanistic ideas about biological phenomena are
misleading and often false. They also reveal how science actually supports
a much more dynamic and complex picture of ecological relationships both
within and between living organisms. We attempt to advance a nuanced and
dynamic picture of life that is crucial for sustain­ability education.

The fact that every organism is, in the first place, an activity has
radical implications for biology. It was Aristotle who first
characterized animals as “self-moving,” and not many in biology today
would disagree. Yet this truth is rarely taken with real seriousness.
This article lays out some of the most important issues, ranging from the
old struggle between reductionism and vitalism to contemporary
perplexities of cognitive science having to do with mind and body,
perception and consciousness, thought and object of thought.

Class Reading:
High school (grade 12) courses in Life Sciences;
undergraduate courses in History and Philosophy of Science and Life
Sciences.

Whether we view them at the molecular level or as we naturally encounter
them, organisms appear to be agents carrying out intentions, even if
unconsciously or not in anything like a human manner. But what do we mean
by “agency” and “intention?”

Class Reading:
High school (grade 12) courses in Life Sciences; undergraduate and
graduate courses in History and Philosophy of Science and Life Sciences.

Excerpts from a much longer article,
Genes and Organisms:
Improvising the Dance of Life, attempting to show the place of DNA
within the context of both the cell and organism as integral unities. A
key lesson: the organism knows what it is doing with its DNA.

Class Reading:
High school (grade 12); undergraduate and graduate courses in Life
Sciences.

Thinking in biology hasn’t caught up with the results of contemporary
research. In particular, an apparent taboo against any explicit
acknowledgment of intention and agency in all features and activities of
the organism is a serious block to further progress in understanding.

Class Reading:
High school (grade 12) courses in Life Sciences; undergraduate and
graduate courses in History and Philosophy of Science and Life Sciences.

This article critically examines the strong emphasis upon machine-like
design in conventional biology, and draws from the most recent research
findings to argue that this framework is now scientifically obsolete.

Class Reading:
High school (grade 12) courses in Life Sciences; undergraduate and
graduate courses in History and Philosophy of Science and Life Sciences.

A microorganism known as Deinococcus radiodurans can endure massive
doses of radiation that fragment its genome into hundreds of pieces. Its
proteins simply reassemble a whole genome from the fragments. It raises a
question that turns out to be universally applicable: Where is wisdom
stored in the organism? No place in particular — and certainly not only in
the genome. Instead, we are led to think of the organism in its totality
as an active agent in the world.

Class Reading:
High school (grade 12) courses in Life Sciences; undergraduate and
graduate courses in History and Philosophy of Science and Life Sciences.

The development of complex organisms tells a dramatic story about the
plasticity of DNA in the “hands” of the whole cell and whole organism. The
story of development is first of all a story — a narrative with intention
and direction — not merely a series of physical causes and effects. The
text we present here is excerpted from Steve’s article,
Genes and the Central Fallacy of
Evolutionary Theory.

Class Reading:
High school (grade 12) courses in Life Sciences; undergraduate and
graduate courses in History and Philosophy of Science and Life Sciences.

For those seeking a more holistic understanding of biology than
conventional academic approaches provide, this article highlights a few
signs of potential health and transformation, particularly in the
literature of molecular biology. The purpose here is to convey a hint of
how researchers are increasingly finding themselves grappling with the
incredible fluidity and plasticity of organisms under the influence of a
governing context, and to point to implications that many biologists
haven’t yet fully appreciated due to the inertia of old habits of thought.

Class Reading:
High school (grade 12) courses in Life Sciences; undergraduate and
graduate courses in History and Philosophy of Science and Life Sciences.

A provocative essay illuminating how holistic approaches to biology
provide a broader framework for understanding living organisms than
conventional reductionist approaches. It suggests going beyond the limits
of the conventional, mechanistic emphasis that every organism strives to
survive — or, that an organism’s traits can be explained through a process
of random variation and survival of the fittest — to recognize that every
organism strives to express its own wholeness. “To whatever extent we can
actually see a distinctive, characteristic, and expressive unity of the
organism that survives — as opposed to mere functional efficiency — we
have already demonstrated the inadequacy of the ‘collection of survival
mechanisms’ view.”

Class Reading:
High school (grade 12) Evolutionary Biology and Life Sciences;
undergraduate and graduate courses in History and Philosophy of Science
and Life Sciences.

6. Agriculture and Sustainability

This article traces the tragic cultural history that led to the U.S. Dust
Bowl of the 1930s as well as to our current soil crisis, and explores what
we can learn from it about the inextricable relationship between soil,
human culture, and our social and ecological responsibilities.

Class Reading:
High school courses in Ecology, Geography, and History;
undergraduate courses in Ecology, Environmental Science, Sustainability,
and Science, Technology, and Society.

An essay critically examining our relationship to domestic farm animals
and how it reflects a lack of understanding about the essential role of
ecological reciprocity in sustainable agriculture. Industrialized farming
is the result not only of political and economic interests, but also of
our own way of seeing, thinking, and speaking about the world. What we
meet in a factory farm is not only a particularly efficient system but an
expression of human consciousness. If we strive to shift to a more living
understanding of nature, we could redefine our breeding goals into a much
broader perspective, far beyond just a narrow sense of utility or an
abstract sense of animal welfare. The standard of animal health will be
provided by the animals themselves – that is, by our own contextual
understanding of their wholeness as living beings. A breeder or farmer
would then begin to ask: “Am I contributing toward or hindering the
organic integrity of this animal? Is it healthy and whole? Will the new
characteristics I’m trying to breed for contribute to the health of my
farm? And will my farm contribute to this creature’s health?”

Class Reading:
High school courses in Ecology, Geography, and History; undergraduate
courses in Ecology, Environmental Science, Sustainability, and Science,
Technology, and Society.

For the farmer or gardener to develop a more personal relationship to the
unique organism that their own farm or garden actually is, a whole new
commitment to agriculture, composting, and life process is demanded. To
work with compost is to humbly accept an invitation to rethink our
relationship with the earth while actively engaging in a process of
composition. The old saying that we come to know the health of a farm
through its compost yard gains new meaning and depth when we begin to
understand composting as being an activity that goes beyond utilitarian
purposes of yields and waste management. It means to start seeing the
compost pile as an outer expression of our way of thinking and relating to
Nature. The pile begins to show itself as the outer expression of the
gardener or farmer’s inner gesture.

Class Reading:
High school courses in Ecology, Geography, and History; undergraduate
courses in Ecology, Environmental Science, Sustainability, and Science,
Technology, and Society.

How do you control insects by attracting and repelling them at the same
time? Hundreds of African farmers, particularly in Kenya, have been
delighted to learn that a “push-pull” method really does the trick. The
ambitious and economically important research program behind this
development tells us a lot about how science can contribute to ecological
and social transformation. The article describes key features of such
context-sensitive action for constructive social change and ecological
protection.

Class Reading:
High school courses in Ecology, Geography, and History; undergraduate
courses in Ecology, Environmental Science, Sustainability, and Science,
Technology, and Society.

Is the cow a complex genetic mechanism that we can manipulate at will for
human ends, or is it an organism with its own integrity that warrants our
respect? This article exemplifies the power of a holistic, contextual
approach to tackle complex issues of technology and animal welfare. “As
long as we treat [the cow] as a commercial bioreactor, there is no reason
not to continue trying to increase production. But if we remember that the
cow is an organism, then we must ask how far we can healthily push milk
production. By gaining insight into the cow as a ‘small world, existing
for its own sake’ [Goethe], we can recognize its specific characteristics
and needs, and begin to fit our actions into its context.”

Class Reading:
High school courses in Ecology, Geography, and History; undergraduate
courses in Ecology, Environmental Science, Sustainability, and Science,
Technology, and Society.

7. Impacts of Mechanistic Thinking and Technology

What happens when genetic engineers begin to envision the synthesis of
altogether new life forms, using Lego block-like “BioBricks”? The ambition
may be foolish, but huge resources are now being devoted to it, with grave
implications for the biological future. This article provides an
introduction to synthetic biology and the ethical and ecological
challenges it presents.

Class Reading:
High school (grades 11-12) courses in Genetics and Life Sciences and
(grade 12) Social Studies; undergraduate and graduate courses in Ethics,
Life Sciences, Philosophy, and Science, Technology, and Society.

Pointing to both unintended consequences and profound ethical issues, this
article examines both the details and the broader context of the
controversial 2015 experiments in China to “edit” the genome of human
embryos.

Class Reading:
High school (grades 11-12) courses in Genetics and Life Sciences and
(grade 12) Social Studies; undergraduate and graduate courses in Ethics,
Life Sciences, Philosophy, and Science, Technology, and Society.

A head-on critique of the emerging field of synthetic bioengineering,
euphemistically named “synthetic biology” by its practitioners. An oak
tree does not at all have the same way of being as a weeping willow, nor
is an amoeba’s movement (whether at the level of the whole organism or of
molecular process) choreographed in the style of a paramecium’s. If and
when synthetic biologists start discussing how they might reproduce such a
unique gesturing — a gesturing they must carefully, deliberately and
knowledgeably compound out of the innumerable molecular activities
proceeding simultaneously and interdependently in the cell — all in order
to produce from scratch a particular sort of organism with a particular
sort of recognizable character, then one could believe they have begun to
glimpse the problem of attempting to synthesize life. Otherwise, such
efforts are little more than “crude and mostly ignorant, trial-and-error
manipulation of already living things. . . a technologically sophisticated
discipline of tinkering.”

Class Reading:
High school (grades 11-12) courses in Ecology, Life Sciences, Philosophy,
and Social Studies; undergraduate and graduate courses in Ecology,
Environmental Sciences, Evolutionary Biology, History and Philosophy of
Science, Life Sciences, Molecular Biology, Philosophy, and Science,
Technology, and Society.

Written for lay readers, Beyond Biotechnology is an accessible
introduction to the complicated issues of genetic engineering and its
potential applications. It evaluates the state of genetic science and
engineering, examining its actual and potential applications, especially
in agriculture and medicine, as well as its dangers. The authors show how
the popular view of genetics does not include an understanding of the ways
in which genes actually work together in organisms. Simplistic and
reductionist views of genes lead to unrealistic expectations and,
ultimately, disappointment in the results that genetic engineering
actually delivers. The authors explore such developments in genetics, as
the discovery of “non-Darwinian” adaptive mutations in bacteria and
growing evidence that organisms are far more than mere collections of
genetically driven mechanisms. They also answer vital questions that get
to the essence of genetic interaction with human biology: Does DNA
“manage” an organism any more than the organism manages its DNA? Should
genetically engineered products be labeled as such? Do the methods of the
genetic engineer resemble the centuries-old practices of animal husbandry?

Class Reading:
High school (grades 11-12) courses in Genetics, Life Sciences, Social
Studies and (grade 12) Philosophy; undergraduate and graduate courses in
Ethics, Life Sciences, Philosophy, and Science, Technology, and Society.

From Odysseus to the Amazon jungle, from feeding chickadees by hand to the
high abstractions of science – this booklet looks at the role of
technology in human life and in the management (or mismanagement) of
nature, and also assesses our future prospects. Readers may find the
insights it offers outrageous or revelatory, but they will never find them
conventional. See especially Chapter One: “Deceiving Virtues of
Technology.” The printed booklet can be purchased from our
bookstore, or
downloaded for free.

Class Reading:
Undergraduate and graduate courses in Education, Engineering, History and
Philosophy of Science, Information Technology, and Philosophy.

This prescient, award-winning book correctly predicted — contrary to
widespread political and commercial hype at the time — that heavily
investing in computer technology for K-12 classrooms would not lead to a
renaissance in American education. The book’s concerns and critiques, in
terms of the seductions of technology and the too often ignored
developmental needs of children, remain pertinent to current wishful
thinking about the role of advanced electronic media in the education of
children and about advanced technologies in general being the “solution”
to all that ails society.

Class Reading:
Undergraduate and graduate courses in Education and History and Philosophy
of Science.

This essay offers a critical look at how the very nature of the living
organism is being made into a subject for both trivial gaming and
commercialized re-engineering. As the examples in this article show, these
ambitions and efforts reveal how important it is to move in a different
direction — to anchor human thought and action in concrete perception and
experience and in respect for living organisms.

Class Reading:
High school (grades 11-12) courses in Ecology and Life Sciences;
undergraduate and graduate courses in Ecology, Environmental Science,
History and Philosophy of Science, and Life Sciences.

Teacher Resource:
High school (grades 11-12) and postsecondary educators.

Which of our genes make us human? None of them and all of them. The
question, it turns out, betrays a grave misunderstanding of genes and
people. As long as genetic engineers view organisms as mechanisms in a
world separate from them, there is no real question of responsibility.
Ethical considerations in this case are after-the-fact and considered
outside the scientific process. Only when we incorporate the qualitative
into the scientific process — when our way of viewing consciously includes
the other being from the outset — can we begin to heal this split.

Class Reading:
High school and undergraduate courses in Environmental Science and Life
Sciences.

Brief reflections upon the ecology of human society, originally presented
at the 2001 Technology and Globalization Teach-In in New York City.
Freedom of cultures to choose modernization cannot be denied, and the
human individual today cannot help feeling a certain pull toward the
global and universal. But this does not imply that we should pursue
current globalization policies, which tend to extinguish both cultures and
the individual. Truly ecological thinking will be flexible and imaginative
enough to hold these “opposites” in harmonious counterpoint – something
not yet achieved with the destructive globalization processes of today.
Only strong local communities can make globalization worthwhile and every
local community is a habitat bound up with neighboring habitats “and so
on, ever outward.”

Class Reading:
High school courses in Social Studies; undergraduate and graduate courses
in Sustainability, Sociology, and Science, Technology, and Society.

This special Nature Institute project tracks evidence of the wide-ranging
and never wholly predictable effects of genetic engineering. We have
collected examples from the scientific literature, primarily from
peer-reviewed journals, and written short reports on each example. These
are ordered according to different categories and include effects on the
manipulated organisms themselves as well as broader environmental ripple
effects. Our compilation of reports is by no means exhaustive and
continues to expand over time.

Class Reading (and Research Resource):
High school courses in Ecology, Life Sciences, and Social Studies;
undergraduate and graduate courses in Evolutionary Biology, Life Sciences,
Molecular Biology, and Science, Technology, and Society.

Teacher and Researcher Resource:
High school, postsecondary educators and researchers.

8. Foundations of Holistic, Contextual Science

This article provides a lucid introduction to Goethe’s approach to science
for educators and students. As Craig explains, his approach “was truly
ecological – he always tried to understand things in relation to their
broader connections.” In Goethe’s view, understanding “can only be gained
when we consider the relations and connections in which any given subject
is embedded. This is ecology as a way of knowing.”

Class Reading:
High school (grade 12) courses in Ecology, Gardening, and Life Sciences;
undergraduate and graduate courses in Ecology, Environmental Science,
History and Philosophy of Science, Life Sciences, and Philosophy.

Practicing the Goethean approach to science involves heightened
methodological awareness and sensitivity to the way we engage in the
phenomenal world. We need to overcome our habit of viewing the world in
terms of objects and leave behind the scientific propensity to explain via
reification and reductive models. Science is a conversation with nature
and this perspective can inform a new scientific frame of mind. This
article presents the Goethean approach via a practical example (a study of
a plant, skunk cabbage) and discuss some of the essential features of
Goethean methodology and insight: the riddle; into the phenomenon; exact
picture building; and seeing the whole.

Class Reading:
High school (grade 12) courses in Science; undergraduate courses in
Ecology, Environmental Science, History and Philosophy of Science, and Life
Sciences.

An essay reviewing and reflecting on the implications of a significant
recent paper by whole-organism biologist, Mark Riegner, which tackles the
once-dismissed question whether organisms can be thought of as having an
essential nature — that is, whether they exemplify a type or
archetype. Riegner suggests that the time is ripe for revival of
this concept, if only it is understood correctly. And he turns to Goethe
for such an understanding, arguing that recent developments in the
biological and evolutionary sciences point toward a serious place for
typological thinking of the sort Goethe advanced. (To request a copy of
Riegner’s article, write him at
mriegner@prescott.edu.)

Class Reading:
Undergraduate and graduate courses in Ecology, Evolutionary Biology,
History and Philosophy of Science, Life Sciences, and Molecular Biology.

Goethe’s seminal essay on the nature of knowing and scientific methodology
and experimentation. Because he had learned that “in living nature nothing
happens that is not in connection with a whole,” he recognized that as a
scientist must always view individual facts or results of individual
experiments within larger contexts. For example, individual experiments do
not provide “proofs;” rather, one needs to carry out a series of
experiments, varying the conditions to gain real insight into phenomena.

Class Reading:
High school (grades 11-12) courses in Science; undergraduate courses in
Ecology, Environmental Science, History & Philosophy of Science, and Life
Sciences.

What Goethe said of his pioneering morphological research is often
repeated of Goethean science as a whole: “its intention is to portray
rather than explain” (Goethe 1995, p. 57). Difficult words. The idea seems
to be that description — or at least description of the right sort — leads by
itself to scientific understanding. This is implied more strongly in
another of his oft-repeated koans: “everything in the realm of fact is
already theory .... Let us not seek for something behind the
phenomena — they themselves are the theory” (p. 307). Goethe is contrasting
a particular sort of portrayal with a particular sort of explanation, and
is suggesting that the portrayal is a fuller, more adequate form of
explanation. This essay briefly sketches the contrast between Goethean
portrayal and the constricted sort of explanation that continues to be
honored as the ideal of hard science.

Class Reading:
Undergraduate and graduate courses in Ecology, History and Philosophy of
Science, and Life Sciences.

A response to critiques of holistic approaches in environmental science as
veering into “eco-mysticism.” References to the “idea” or “nature” of a
plant or animal species does not need to refer to a metaphysical essence
of some sort. In fact, in the practice of Goethean science:

The Goethean researcher is interested in observable phenomena, and has no
desire to press behind the phenomena to some sort of metaphysical essence.

The Goethean researcher who speaks of the nature of an organism is
referring to its inner unity of being — “inner” because this unity is
conceptual.

“Conceptual” does not mean subjective. When one struggles to conceive the
nature of the organism, one is struggling to find the concepts (the ideas,
the interior being) that belong to the organism and are, as formal
cause, generative of its unity. (This, however, can hardly make
much sense so long as one is bound by our culture’s normal rendering of
terms such as “concept,” “cause,” and “idea.”)

There is no reason to take the observed unity of the organism as
unchanging or incapable of evolution. The nature of an organism just is
what it is (what it is observed to be), and if it evolves with time, this
can be seen as part of its dynamic aspect. The potential for continually
transformed expression is, after all, intrinsic to any truly vital idea.

Class Reading:
Undergraduate and graduate courses in Ecology, History and Philosophy of
Science, and Life Sciences.

For educators, an introductory guide to teaching methods in holistic
science: “I have often thought that if a teacher wanted to have one
succinct motto to hang above his or her bed, she’d have a hard time
finding a better one than: “characterize, don’t define.” In order to
characterize, say, an animal, we have to carry within ourselves a vivid
picture of its shape, how it moves, the sounds it makes, its habitat and
the ways it relates to its environment. We bring alive through our
imagination and speech something of the animal’s nature . . . When we
paint a picture of the animal in this way — a process in which the students
are involved — the animal can begin to live in the soul of the child or
adolescent.” (This article originally appeared in Renewal: A Journal for
Waldorf Education, Fall 2005.)

9. Goethe and Other Holistic Scientists

Goethe’s seminal essay on the nature of knowing and scientific methodology
and experimentation. Because he had learned that “in living nature nothing
happens that is not in connection with a whole,” he recognized that as a
scientist must always view individual facts or results of individual
experiments within larger contexts. For examples, individual experiments
do not provide “proofs;” rather, one needs to carry out a series of
experiments, varying the conditions to gain real insight into phenomena.

Class Reading:
High school (grades 11-12) courses in Science; undergraduate courses in
Ecology, Environmental Science, History and Philosophy of Science, and Life
Sciences.

This book is an excellent guide for educators seeking to understand what
phenomena-based science instruction means and how to provide such
instruction at the high school and undergraduate level. It includes many
suggested classroom and outdoor activities for students (especially in
physics) and makes a powerful philosophical case for the importance of
both educating and trusting human sensory experience. It also explores the
relation between sense experience and knowing, the role of human intention
in awareness, and the importance of older students becoming aware of their
own processes in gaining knowledge. The authors – two physicists and a
philosopher – demonstrate how understanding in the physical sciences
requires rigorous attention to the physiology and psychology of the human
being who seeks to know, as well as rigorous attention to the physical
phenomena being studied. The full 174-page book is freely available to
download.

Class Activities:
High school courses in Physics and (grade 12) Philosophy; undergraduate
courses in History and Philosophy of Science, Philosophy, and Physics.

An excerpt from marine biologist E.S. Russell’s 1930 book, The
Interpretation of Development and Heredity: A Study in Biological
Method, which contains a remarkably up-to-date understanding of
whole-organism biology. In this excerpt, the author begins with the
provocative assertion: “Biology occupies a unique and privileged position
among the sciences in that its object, the living organism, is known to us
not only objectively through sensory perception, but also in one case
directly, as the subject of immediate experience. It is therefore
possible, in this special case of one’s own personal life, to take an
inside view of a living organism.”

Class Reading:
Undergraduate courses in Ecology, History and Philosophy of Science, and
Life Sciences.

A biographical sketch of the life and holistic research of the brilliant
20th-century cell biologist, Paul Weiss. Weiss combined clear, precise
observation of the organism with equally clear thinking in his studies of
the development and functioning of the nervous system and of embryology
and development in general. His prominent achievements – including a
leading textbook, Principles of Development: A Text in Experimental
Embryology – can serve as a beacon for those trying honestly to follow
the lead of the many surprising biological findings of the 21st century.
The article is introduced with a short, and surprising, reflection on the
meaning of the widely used phrase “the whole is greater than the sum of
its parts.”

Class Reading:
Undergraduate courses in Ecology, History and Philosophy of Science, and
Life Sciences.

A close look at the life and work of Kurt Goldstein, a neurologist and
psychiatrist who created a holistic theory of the organism. Goldstein
described his goal in research as “to provide the kind of environment
which allows for the most complete realization of the nature of each
creature.” A link to a companion
short
biography of Goldstein, pioneer of holism, is included.

Class Reading:
Undergraduate courses in Ecology, History and Philosophy of Science, and
Life Sciences.